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| Credit: http://philstar.com |
Imagine yourself looking outside from the window of your home, your heartbeat picking up its pace as you see the unbelievably strong winds sway the coconut trees. After a few minutes, you see pieces of wood splinters, metal scraps and concrete blocks flying out of nowhere. The heavy rainfall is deafening, accompanied with the distant voices of people screaming outside and asking for help. Water level rises up to your leg, your knee, your thigh, your waist. You help your sick grandmother and your little brother move to the higher floor of your home. You prayed hard that the waters would not reach the second floor. You hear the loud wave of water from afar, and your body trembled all over. With a split second like a tsunami, a surge of water beat down the concrete walls of your home. You found yourself struggling to hold on to pieces of debris, realizing that your brother and grandmother are suddenly nowhere to be found. You felt your heart break into a million pieces, you felt that this day will be your last. You managed to hold on to a rusty pole, covering your face from the torrent. Your whole life you'd never have imagined yourself to be in such a place, experiencing fear, grief, and hopelessness to an ultimate extent.
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| Credit: http://philstar.com |
Imagine yourself sitting in the dirty, grimy concrete floor of the evacuation center, people scurrying around, struggling to survive. Your body is bruised, feet splintered with pieces of wood and glass. Your throat is dry, stomach in pain, feeling nauseous as it was your second day without food. You had no choice but to drink salt water. Everything is sinking in--you cannot find your grandmother and brother, memories of them kept playing in your mind. You are in total shock, and tears welled up in your eyes as you stare blankly across the area, people wailing, feeling anxious for their missing loved ones, and grieving for the ones they lost.
Related: "What's Your Tragedy?"
Related: "What's Your Tragedy?"
Imagine yourself experiencing all of this. Imagine yourself being in their place. Imagine yourself--all your property and your loved ones gone in a split second. This is what our kababayans are experiencing right now. This is reality for them. If you were in their place, you would want all the help that you can get.
You are blessed to be reading this. You are blessed to have a roof above your home, food on your table, to have a stable internet connection. You have all the resources that you need. You have more than enough, and if you have these things, what's keeping you to move, to help? Instead of posting selfies in Facebook, playing Video Games and complaining about your life, why don't you use your spare change to buy a kilo of rice and some mineral water bottles and drop it off in the nearest McDonald's? Don't say that you can't do anything. Prayers are great, but we are given blessings not just to count them but to share them. Remember that we are built for good works, we are made to show compassion. I hope this post encourages you to do something. Let's help our fellowmen. God bless the Philippines. #bangonPilipinas
Here is a resource page on how you can help: http://www.mb.com.ph/help-yolanda-victims/
I recommend this book to anyone who wants to understand compassion and helping others in a Christian perspective:
Compassion: A Reflection on the Christian Life
In this provocative essay on that least understood virtue, compassion, the authors challenge themselves and us with these questions: Where do we place compassion in our lives? Is it enough to live a life in which we hurt one another as little as possible? Is our guiding ideal a life of maximum pleasure and minimum pain? Compassion answers no. 
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